Neo Clouds, AI Infrastructure and the UK Data Centre Opportunity | Live at Datacloud Global Congress 2026

In the first episode of a new series recorded live at Datacloud Global Congress 2026 in Cannes, Andy Davis is joined by co-host Rory Flashman from Spa Communications to explore one of the biggest talking points in the data centre industry: neo clouds, AI infrastructure and the next phase of digital infrastructure growth. 

Joining the conversation: 

David Bloom, Kao Data 

Pete Hill, CUDO Compute 

Together, they unpack what neo cloud actually means, how GPU-driven infrastructure is reshaping the market, and why the relationship between hyperscalers, cloud providers and emerging AI infrastructure companies is more complementary than many people assume. 

The discussion also looks at how AI workloads are changing data centre design, from density and cooling to power, floor loading and long-term flexibility. With technology moving quickly and facilities expected to operate for decades, the conversation highlights the engineering challenge of building infrastructure that can support both today’s demand and tomorrow’s unknowns. 

Recorded live at Datacloud Global Congress 2026 in Cannes. 

Key Topics: 

• What neo cloud means and why the term has become central to AI infrastructure 
• How GPU-led AI workloads differ from traditional cloud infrastructure 
• Whether neo clouds are disrupting hyperscalers or complementing them 
• The impact of AI on data centre design, density, cooling and power requirements 
• Why the UK can remain competitive in the AI infrastructure market 
• The difference between training and inference workloads, and where the UK may have an advantage 
• Why power availability, energy cost and grid capacity remain major constraints 
• How local engagement and community benefit can improve public understanding of data centre development 
• The growing capital requirements behind AI data centre projects 
• Why delivery, reliability and consistency still matter more than headline-grabbing announcements 

Tune in for a lively conversation on how AI is reshaping the data centre market, what neo clouds mean for the wider industry, and why the next phase of growth will depend on power, partnerships, local engagement and the ability to deliver. 

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_05 0:00

The data center industry is moving faster than ever. First thing is seriously smart, people are making it all happen. Welcome to the Inside Data Center Podcast, where we dive into the stories, insights, and innovations driving real change across the industry. From hyperscale campuses to game-changing technologies, we're talking to the people shaping the future of digital infrastructure. Whether you live in breed data centers or just want to understand what's powering our connected world, you're in the right place. Welcome to Inside Data Center Podcast. We're back on the terrace in Cannes. Good to see you. I'm joined by Rory Flashman, my co-host. Good to see you. And we are today on the first episode in the Sunshine, joined by David Bloom from KO Data Centres and Pete Hill, Kudo Compute. Good morning, both of you. Good morning. Morning, morning. Bonjour. Bonjour. Very continental. That's as much friends as you're going to get from it. And that's our lot. That's it. That's the end of the podcast. I've only been here for I arrived late afternoon yesterday, and I think one of the things people keep asking me about is Neo Cloud and AI data centers and what's happening in that market. So hopefully we can get a bit of an insight from you both on that on the perspective of that side of the market. But to start with, does anybody want to take this question? Like, what does Neo Cloud actually mean? Because I don't think many people actually know. It's a catchy name, isn't it? Yeah. It works. It's like when we used to say AI all the time or edge data center.

SPEAKER_02 1:25

It's a very good marketer out there. They've got look, we need we need to give this some kind of identity, right? It's a bit like the cloud when that came through in the first place. But you know, it's um it in its most common form, it's a cloud service provider, which is specializing in AI infrastructure. So that's that's the niche, doesn't really go too far out of that. That AI infrastructure can extend up into services above as well. It can sometimes extend into services below, like the land and power, but it's but it's all focused on kind of AI and providing that kind of uh overall AI factory, which is another one. Another AI factory setup.

SPEAKER_05 2:03

And David, do you think there's any difference? Because what we were seeing is kind of the neo clouds put over one side of the industry, developers, operators, kind of the more I could call the standard data center developers in in another side. Is there much difference?

SPEAKER_01 2:15

Well, there there are fundamental differences in my view, in the sense of, and it depends because everybody's feeling their way a little. Um these are these are relatively new businesses, a few years old in the main. Um, and they're trying to work out precisely where in the in the value chain they sit, in the sense of do they go all the way to construction, yeah, or really is this is this a you know GPU as a service layer and everything in between. Um and so actually I think we're we're in the right in the middle now of working that out. Um and obviously unshockingly you'll hear that Andy, I've got opinions. Um That's why you're here. I mean, it turns out, yeah. So I mean I I I I do agree that the neo card branding is is excellent um in the sense of it kind of bit make bit matrix-y. Yeah. Uh um, but actually in reality, um I I always look at it as a difference between CPUs and GPUs. Um so you know, uh a traditional cloud is CPU. Um by the way, if you don't know these acronyms, please look them up at home. Um and um and and the sort of GPU generation now uh is bringing that same kind of now. What did we believe the cloud was? And messy all of my mates who thought it was like actually in the sky, um, bright bunch, um, is that actually is that the the the the cloud was really an infrastructure that was flexible and usable. Um and so all that we're doing now is building that for an AI age.

SPEAKER_03 3:45

It's interesting, like you talk about the cloud, hyperscalers have been seen as like the kind of the dominant force in the data center industry for a very long time, and neo clouds are now the disruptors. But obviously, from your perspective, Pete, do you actually think neo clouds are that disruptive or do you think it's an evolution? It's a bit of both.

SPEAKER_02 4:04

I think um uh is it's disruptive in that it's a kind of almost like a new layer um that's coming into the industry. But it's a new layer because there was a gap, right? And uh there's a gap to fill. Um and you know, to David's point, you know, they and and you know, Jensen talks about this, so this is this has come from a far smarter man than I apparently. But you know, uh traditional cloud is you know you are accessing data, you know, whether that's kind of putting it into there for storage or retrieving it to to be able to use your services. Whereas uh you know, NeoCloud, you know, one of the GPU infrastructure and one of these AI factories is you you are essentially creating a machine that has got one purpose and that is to create tokens to be able to use. So slightly different purposes there. So NeoCloud is is disruptive in the fact that there's this new layer, and because they're you know largely they've they've they're startup businesses and they're coming in, they're scaling quickly, they're being more agile to being able to move quicker and and fill that. But at the same time, it's extremely complementary as well. If you look at a lot of um the custom base for these neo clouds, it is coming from those traditional hyperscalers and uh and other uh cloud service providers as well. So that there's there's there's a way that they can be, you know, asynchronous with each other.

SPEAKER_03 5:15

It's interesting that you you say they're almost like complementary, because I think there's a perception in the market as well that like neo clouds and hyperscalers can or do compete in some respects. I guess what you're saying is that that's not really the case.

SPEAKER_02 5:28

Yeah, I think uh at at this at this point in time, there's uh a level of demand out there in the market and the actual number one driver is is speed to generate in token. Um so so however that is achieved is is often you know what is driving the the business at the moment. I kind of look at you know, even if you look at the uh the silic silicon industry, right? Um, you know, Google is one of the biggest buyers of Nvidia chips, but they're also building their own TPUs. Um and you know, same with AWS and their training them and uh and etc. So um there's there's definite kind of competition in there, and you know, maybe that gets fiercer over the years as things get far more commoditized, but you know, right now it's it's it seems to be complementary as well.

SPEAKER_05 6:08

Awesome. From like an infrastructure perspective or a data center perspective, are the facilities different? Because again, we're trying to, I guess, uh quash some misconceptions here, but are the data centers actually any different or are they is it just the technology within it that's that's different?

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Look, the the the the there are some noticeable differences. I mean, I I would almost go as far as saying it's it's uh that's 8020 or 70-30 rule, 7030 rules or something I invented, but uh we're going with it. Hashtag trayback. Uh uh we're still doing hashtags. Do we do that? Occasionally we are now. We're bringing them back. My kids always pick me up on these, it's like dad, no, that don't even say that anymore. Like, well that was that's only last week. I don't really understand that. But anyway, point is yeah, um, is that the the data centers themselves, of course, are still large industrial buildings. Um you have to think about uh it's really the density uh of the computer that's driving change, yeah, and the way you cool it, therefore uh floor loadings, I mean really exciting stuff like that, yeah, is but but but it's actually quite an engineering challenge because you've got a technology that is actually uh changing quite rapidly. Um uh there's there's uh from backwell to via Rubin to whatever else is coming, right? Um, and simultaneously you're asking your design and construction teams to build something that's gonna have a 20 to 30 year shelf life. Yeah. So that's fun. Yeah. When we don't know what technology is coming. If you like that type of thing. Yeah. Um, but you know, you know certain things, right? So ultimately you want to think about how am I bringing this stuff in and out of the building, yeah, uh how am I powering it, how am I cooling it, how am I securing it, yeah, how am I uh uh you know the clusters are getting actually so you're seeing these buildings in some ways, the the footprint isn't drastically changing, but the the ratio, right? So you're gonna have uh almost in extremist terms, these are like like like small white spaces, yeah, with just an amazing amount of compute in them, yeah, and then the rest of the whole building is just serving that that bit of white space. So um, but yeah, I mean this is this is why uh why we do what we do because ultimately it's not as straightforward. Uh this is not a real estate asset class. Um don't don't don't tell anyone. Don't say that too loud. Yeah, don't say it too loud, but it's not, right? Because you have to perpetually look at uh how you build your design, etc. etc. Um, and then there's the operational element. So when you put all of that into it, it's it's a lot more complex than you know, build megawatts cell methods.

SPEAKER_02 8:44

Actually, I should think the new data centers are very similar to this lovely terrace here. So about an hour ago, air cool-in was sufficient.

SPEAKER_01 8:53

But now we definitely need DOC. And now Andy's got some empathy because because before it was just sympathy, but now he understands how long you have to wait for power. Yeah, I mean you order it, yeah, and you and then suddenly they're oh yeah, no, we said we said it was going to be next quarter, but actually I've got real life experience, real life experience, yeah, power cooling, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 9:14

Put that on my panel later.

SPEAKER_02 9:16

I'll tell you about power problems. Yeah, I'll tell you exactly France. Now the France. We need the no go, mate. Well so do DLC direct liquid to chaps because these are successful.

SPEAKER_03 9:25

No, no, that's definitely something that you've grown there, and at least there on the power front, at least we only had to wait a couple of hours rather than months, I suppose, to uh to get crack it. But let's say let's talk about um let's talk about markets. Both of you, UK founded headquartered companies, um I think it's JL who have said something like by 2030, inference is going to be the predominant workload versus training. Um UK's got a host of problems, land cost of energy, AI copyright, need I go on. Do you really think the UK can be a competitor in the AI market? And and uh I suppose to that point, do you see inference or training being a predominant winner there?

SPEAKER_02 10:11

Uh so so yes, I do think the UK can be um uh a major player uh in the AI economy, global AI economy. Um first of all there are certain things that are gonna have to be done within the UK. And you could you can say that with any any kind of country, right? For for data sovereignty, you know, there's sensitive information that will need to be retained within borders. Um there's latency that comes into that as well. Whilst the UK is a small place, right, which gives us a the benefit of being able to choose multiple locations, you know, um that latency still needs to be very low for certain use cases, not all of them, but certain use cases. But on inference, if you think about if there's gonna be robotics happening in warehouses or there's gonna be um, you know, high frequency trading that's using some kind of AI mechanism, then that stuff's gonna have to be super low latency from that perspective. Um, yeah, uh so answer your question, inference is is is going to grow. And I think we can all see the charts to see it will overtake at some point because training, you're you're building that foundation for all the inference to work, but then the inference is actually the the can can the consumption of that, right? So that's when the applications um are all embedded and it and you know people are using that in their day-to-day lives, whether that's for work or work or pleasure. So absolutely grow. I think I think the UK from um uh the the the constraints we have in the UK, right you've kind of alluded to is is um on the power size from uh from a cost, but also from uh from a capacity point of view. There's solutions around that as well. I'm sure you know David can talk more to that, but there's behind the meter solutions that can that that um uh that can work. You know, how what where if we're looking out five years, are we seeing uh more sovereignty over our power development and generation within the UK as well? You know, more renewables, more we're seeing gravity drop batteries coming in, you know, we're gonna get SMRs by the kind of mid-20, 30s. So there are uh there are solutions out there, I think, that we probably need to capitalize on as a as a country to get them accelerated. But there's certainly ways where we can provide more independence around that power and take away some of those constraints and at the same time, you know, bring the costs of uh power down competitive to to our neighbours.

SPEAKER_03 12:15

Nice. And then from your perspective, obviously brought uh expansion in Harlow, new site in part royal, greater Manchester, what what are you seeing? Is it demand for hyperscale cloud, like a neo clouds, inference workloads, or do you think that you know the UK can can win in the training race?

SPEAKER_01 12:32

So I I mean I I I I too um uh positive about the UK outlook in general. I I accept, and as you know, we we we uh uh have been involved very much in the dialogue around this with UK government, ECUK. Um we don't shy away from the fact that there are challenges here. Um but infrastructure's a long game. Uh it's uh it's you you you're going in for the long term. Um and in the long term the dynamics for the UK haven't really changed in terms of its geographical positioning between America and Europe, um the connectivity that runs through it, yeah, the skills base that it's got. Um, and obviously, you know, the the uh English is still quite a universal language. So if you take all of these things together, uh that's why London, the UK in general, is still a good bet. And okay, are we gonna be an inference island? Possibly. Um we could debate whether actually training is a good use of land in the UK, if you think about it. Is that if I have a if I have an abundance of it, uh I've got fields and fields in uh whatever, Texas, then yeah, I'm not really doing anything else with it. Um but but the UK is a different animal, and Europe as well. I mean it's a classic really, because it this is where you've gotta know your local markets. Yeah, distributed computers in Europe is kind of a must. Yeah, because you're not lopping down, you know, five gigawatt campuses, you're just not. Yeah. Um and um, well, sorry, I'll caveat that with not in the sort of 10-year horizon I think we're discussing here. Yeah, in the sense of both in terms of power generation, but also kind of uh the use of land, right? So you've got to do something different. Yeah, you can't just come here and open another Starbucks, yeah. Um, because the locals would take one sip and go, yeah, that tastes like Starbucks. Yeah, sorry. Uh but I didn't realise it could be the core sponsor of popcorn.

SPEAKER_04 14:34

I think we're open to sponsorship from other community parts. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 14:37

So if you're a coffee company and you're out there and you really want to stick it to the competition, sponsor this podcast or get in touch. But yeah, so my I suppose my my overarching point here is that actually the fundamentals are still the fundamentals. Um and yes, we have to innovate and it's our responsibility as well as a as an industry to educate, innovate, uh, engage in this dialogue, help solve problems. Yeah, we can't just sit there and go, yeah, here are all the problems, you deal with it, right? We've got to come up with uh innovation. But that's again, we're quite good at that. Um, so you know, at the end, I we almost uh we talked about sort of the the change in the cloud, neo-cloud, etc. etc., um, which would traditionally be called an arms race, but actually in this case it's an arms race because a UK company, uh ARM and Cambridge, are the backbone of a lot of this, right? So we are capable of this, uh, and we've done it before, we will do it again, but it requires uh somewhat coordination, actually, which is I know you guys are quite involved in that. Um when I say you guys, because this is a podcast, I mean Rory and Andy. Um, you know, we need to engage, yeah, and we don't possibly do enough of that.

SPEAKER_05 15:47

Yeah, and I think part of the misconception why the the UK and other key hubs, so take the Germany, Amsterdam, yeah, etc., are perceived as not as busy, is because they're not built, they're not getting the headlines with the two gigawatt campuses. That's what people see. Yeah, that's what the media like, and that's what the people see. So I think there's such a huge market underneath all that that's sort of being pushed down the headlines now, and that's why there's a bit more of a misunderstanding around these markets are still very, very busy. It's just a different type of busy.

SPEAKER_01 16:18

Yeah, but I mean let's let's let's really sort of dig in a bit. Like I but a lot of this is Bragg a watch, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_05 16:25

Yeah, this is this I I still want that spreadsheet of what's announced and what's delivered. Yeah, it's just a lot of work.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

Yeah, we we we we have this lovely phrase of but but not billing in the sort of financing world of data centers, but that's like it's missing a fundamental B. Yeah, but but not billing, but not built. Yeah, yeah. Um and built's pretty bloody complex.

SPEAKER_05 16:46

And a lot of them are now are now announced pre even pre-funding. Yes, they're they're announced like oh, we're gonna develop a 1.5 gigawatt data center campus in X location. Yeah, haven't even got funding.

SPEAKER_01 16:56

And I tell the team all the time, you know, the thing is is that our job, especially as as established uh uh around this table, as established players and veterans in the in the industry, um, you know, our job is to listen to music under the noise. Yeah, we you know, we're we've been in this a while, we've got businesses to run, good businesses, yeah, and we're growing. Yeah, and you know, cannot get distracted by the just sheer volume of noise, yeah, because in the end, yeah, what will w win out? Reliability, delivery, yeah, and and consistency. Yeah, and that's across everything. And that's also again why, back to the question about the UK, is that we have a history of traditional stability, uh, the ability to deliver. So, yes, do we have to get back on our A game in some areas? Absolutely. Um, but it will happen.

SPEAKER_02 17:47

I uh I was at an awards evening recently, and uh they one of the awards was Greenfield Project of the Year. And I just imagined a load of judges stood around the field thinking, I love the vision. The Greenfield Project of the Year.

SPEAKER_03 18:00

We should congratulate you on your award as well. No one launched Business of the Year. Yeah, that's a new category.

SPEAKER_05 18:07

I mean half the press, K Odeo picking up on a congratulation. An award last night. Oh yeah, of course. Should congratulate you on while we're here.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Yeah, no, uh look, it's a particularly special award, uh Andy. Um because no, it really is. Uh the reason being is it ties in a little bit to what we should be doing more of. Um so and I can take no credit for this. This is all the hard work for the team, um, particularly uh Lizzie, Adam, like um, and all of the um all of the the construction and design team. Yeah, we engage, and we've been doing this before it was sort of uh cool. It's the sense of um engaging locally, right? We have to be part of these communities. We can't be this big scary thing that's coming into their community. And it doesn't need to be like that, right? I mean, I'll give you a uh an example um which is a part of our sympathy. Um, in the Senate Services Stockport, um, where we're uh the Greater Manchester area, where we are building um our facility, um, due to that the work we did in that community and then the seed fund that we launched, we we got universal support, uh, which is kind of unheard of in reality. Yeah, we see a lot of these headlines of objections and you know pitchforks and blah blah blah. And reality is, is I actually really believe is because there's no investment going into uh investing locally, helping people understand why this is a benefit to them. You gotta do we've got to do our jobs, right? Um it we can't just from the like a lofty place kind of go, no, no, no, this is national interest, yeah, step aside, right? Um most people, as we see in the in like the local people's just just gone by the local elections, right? At the end of the day, people want their bins collected. Yeah, that's what it's about, right? Um, and if that's not working, they don't care about geopolitics or any of this other stuff, right? Or digital infrastructure. So you we as companies have to show how we uh are additive uh to those communities, how we create opportunity in those communities and how we regenerate. I mean, Harlow's a great example. Um we are that site was the heart of the community. It was the Nortel networks, it was there for 50 years. Prior to that, it was STC Labs. Like you had in the town like the Nortel Playing Fields, yeah, the Nortel Country Club. Like they were like embedded in the DNA. And when they went, yeah, like that overnight, yeah, it it was devastating, right? And our job has been not just to you know deliver our scheme, but to bring some of that back to the town. And we've worked really, you know, we have a really good relationship, two-way relationship with the council there. Yeah, um, you know, we've done a lot of that, and it's great to see. I mean, they they they so I I I'll stop here, but the point is is that is that that local council swept the board at the last election, um, and not just because of us, but because of the work they do, partner public-private partnerships, yeah, and and really focusing on what the town needs. Um, so I I think I want to see more of that.

SPEAKER_05 21:10

100%. Couldn't agree more. I think so much we could talk about that all day, but there's so much this industry can do from a community perspective, and there are like you said, I'll just great things happening out there. We just need to talk about them more, which hopefully we can help. From a capital perspective, obviously the amount of capital required in this sector now is just skyrocketing. It it seems to be at a zero every every other week. Has that changed the way we are now or has it changed the market and has it changed the way we're now building data centers? Because the the the amount of capital required in order to get you obviously the investors need to get a return. Is it changing the way we we build these facilities?

SPEAKER_01 21:47

That is a question for me. Um the the the look, yeah, simple answer yes, it has to. Um again back to that innovation point. We need to find uh the build costs have gone up generally. Scale's gone up. So as you say, you know, the amount of capital you need to deliver a 50 or 100 megawatt data center is uh funnily enough, five to ten times the amount that you need to deliver a 10 megawatt data center uh using my um sharp mental mass. Um but you know, it's it's more than just that in the sense of what we need to look at is time to market, how we're delivering these things, as you we talked in the beginning, how robust they are from the longevity perspective. Um and so how's that going to happen? I mean, that's really the question. Is we can all say, yeah, yeah, yeah, that needs to happen. Um, well, I I think number one is we need to embrace more uh the idea of uh of of just in time delivery for things. So, you know, what how are we designing these data centers to be a look uh even more granular, even more modular? Yeah, um, and also looking at how we um uh everything from the materials we use to the uh to the way that we generate energy. Um so obviously this is gonna be a big point at this conference of power, power, power. Um, and what we touched upon it, uh everybody's touched upon it, the bottom line is that power is scarce, right? So we need to find ways to A, use that as efficiently as possible, and B is generate more clean energy. Yeah, and whether that is local, but you know, via microgrids, things like that. So, and this is again, uh it can't just be coming from one part of the industry. It's it's it's it's the it's the operators, it's the data center uh uh builders, it's the end customers, and we've all got to I suppose also you know not just do what we did last time. Yeah, so for example, uh controversial subject does and should a data center have rely on a grid connection. It's actually we need to move away from that. Um and now there'll be gasps out there in the uh uh in the audience because um can you imagine going to a customer and saying they're not gonna have a grid connection? Um however, uh this all depends on the robustness of the power generation. Yeah, and actually that way, the there's also benefits if we're if we're putting in and creating power generation, um, we can also potentially do that back to the the the the local story for the locale. Yeah, so we've got to start thinking a little bit more laterally, um, but it's difficult to do because everything you you've also got to deliver the day-to-day, yeah, which is really busy. Yeah, so it's kind of how do you step in and out and keep moving forward at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 24:40

I think I think from a from a financing point of view as well, right? If if I take the kind of neo cloud view on this, you've got uh you know absolutely the kind of data center layer, and that's usually working with a partner like a KO data, for example. But as I said, a lot of neo clouds are kind of starting to move into you know some kind of data ownership as well. So let's call that a round number, right? Might be say 10 million a megawatt or something in that region. Then you've got, if you fill in that with the GPUs, that's that's anywhere between six to ten times more than that, right? So uh, and then you look at the kind of different uh assets from a GPU point of view, you're you'll generally speak and you'll depreciate them over five years, whereas uh the data center you might be depreciated over 10 years or something. So you've you've got this kind of disparity there. So the the the the you know uh a lot of the reasons why there's there's uh there's operators out there and we we kind of jest about it beforehand of saying, you know, we're we're we're shovel ready, you know. Hopefully they've got the permits and hopefully they've got, you know, if they but they're they're shovel ready is because pressing the button on all of that is it is an enormously expensive thing to do before you've got a contract and and be able to get that money from your banks or whoever your financing partners is you know is is is difficult. Um the same goes on the GPU layer, but that's a different set of financing partners. So getting all of these kind of stars to align, just you know, just to get kind of one contract sometimes because a lot of these buildings are being built for single tenancy now, is it's uh it's um it's an in it's an interesting challenge.

SPEAKER_03 26:04

Complex it certainly is not easy, as I would say, it's certainly not easy. Well, look, chaps, appreciate your time. That I mean, talking of time, we are up. So the last very marketing question for me how's the event been for you and uh what are you excited about seeing over the next couple of days? Yeah, I mean the uh the event has just started really.

SPEAKER_02 26:24

Uh I think this this is this is actually in my case, the very first thing. I had uh had a nice swim in the sea this morning, so that's but that's putting me in the right kind of mindset for for the rest of the few days. Um and it's gonna be you know, all meetings up here on the terrace in the the pleasing hot sun, unfortunately. It's some directors, director chat's calling. Director chaps calling, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 26:45

And David, how about you? You wal been last night, big highlight.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

Yeah, yeah. So I mean we're roll off to a good start. Um, so that's great. And it's a bit I I I one of the things I really enjoy is actually catching up with the the people. Uh you know, uh having been at this event in one way, shape, or form for the past decade, uh, it's just the people that you kind of see from year to year or every every few months at at uh these events, and it's just nice to catch up. So uh that sounds a very uh kind of uh self-centered and non-business um but it's not. I mean it is a networking. I think networking is really important. I I mean what am I what am I looking to get out of it? Um but I I I'm I'm not a believer that um that change is something that is uh is is is supposed to be massive, yeah, in the sense of you you change happens one step at a time, it's it's it's micro gains. Yeah, um if you look at any high quality sports team, like Arsenal, for example. Hey, got it in in the end there, yeah, that's right. If you look at any high quality sports team, yeah, that the the when it comes to this type of level, which we're all playing at here, it's it's the marginal gains that that that start that movement.

SPEAKER_05 27:55

It's all about set players.

SPEAKER_01 27:56

Yeah, it's all about set or lay, old, right? Yeah, um, and but but that so to me, I'm here looking for that next bit of marginal gain. Yeah, how do we keep re-tightening the screws, yeah, making sure that we're just optimizing, optimizing, optimizing. And that will lead us. Yeah. Um, it's not about going from, oh, I was building in Harlow, now I'm building on Mars, yeah. Yeah, not in my not in my purview. Um, and so that's what I'm kind of here talking to people about.

SPEAKER_02 28:24

Nice. So in the world of AI, humans are still buying from humans. Good.

SPEAKER_01 28:27

Absolutely. The most important thing. Yeah, exactly. Uh and some of us will become artisan cheesemakers, which I'm looking forward to. I'll tuck that when you find the ARAs.

SPEAKER_05 28:36

Yeah, absolutely. But we'll end on that one. Thanks both. Enjoyed it very much. Thank you very much. Go find some shadow again. That's it for this episode of the Inside Data Centre Podcast. Thanks for tuning in. This show is brought to you by Data X and Data Exec, the recruitment partners powering global talent across the data centre and digital infrastructure world. If you enjoyed today's conversations, don't forget to follow, like, and subscribe. It really helps us grow the podcast community. Stay tuned for more stories, insights, and conversations with the people shaping the future of our industry.